heeeey everyone :$ it's been a while, hasn't it? but I just didn't have anything to write, you know? or I was just too lazy or too busy or whatever. anyway this idea is courtesy of a wonderful reviewer by the name of Jezebel DeTrazie :) thanks os much for all your reviews and sorry I couldn't get this up sooner but when you told me the idea I was on vacation with the fam and didn't have a chance to get to it for a while. also, I'm pretty sure this is what you meant :$ I really hope you like it ad totally look forward to know what you think of it :)

also, to MaraTwasHere thank you so much and if you want to give me some ideas then go ahead :) I'm really happy you like my fics so much ^_^ it is much appreciated that you told me so 3

anyway, on with the story of which whose characters I do not own! oh and jez and moregad are gonna be like I'd say 15 and 16 here I suppose (seems to be like my fav age ;P)

Picture day

Idea by Jezebel DeTrazie

"This is…this is never going to come out."

Jez put a stiff hand up to her hair. She watched as her reflection did the same.

The Morgead in the mirror scratched his neck and tried to hide his twitching mouth by looking at the wall. He cleared his throat and glanced sidelong at Jez. "You know, I've heard that peanut butter is how you're supposed to get gum out of your hair. If that helps."

Jez's eyes narrowed at Morgead through the mirror. "Don't try and pretend this isn't your fault Morgead."

"Well I'd say you had some part in this, Little Miss–"

"I wasn't the one chewing that huge was of gum, you idiot!" Jez growled, snapping her head to the side so Morgead could see her snarl. "And I'm pretty sure that I wasn't the one who thought it'd be the best idea of this century to see how big of a bubble all that gum would make!"

"Well you were the one who tried to pop the damn thing," Morgead grumbled under his breath as he trudged towards Jez's bedroom door.

As he dragged himself down the stairs en route to the kitchen, Jez's angry voice invaded his head.

You were asking for it, shithead!

Oh yeah, how come?

Whenever I'm chewing gum you always either try and make me choke on it, or you pop all the bubbles I blow!

Well, jumping onto my back to try and get it was just beggingfor gum in your hair if you ask me, Morgead swung open cupboard after cupboard looking for the jar of peanut butter he knew was there. I mean, really Jez, what did you think was going to happen?

Morgead could feel the anger bubbling up inside of Jez and allowed himself a smile of grim satisfaction. Usually it was her who was getting on Morgead's nerves, but today it seemed the tables had turned.

Just hurry up with the damn peanut butter, would you?

A minute later, Morgead glided back into Jez's room with a jar of smooth peanut butter in hand. Jez still stood in front of her mirror staring at the knot of hair on the side of her head that seemed to be sticking in all directions. Although now she seemed to have gotten her fingers stuck in the wild tangle as well.

Morgead tossed the jar from hand to hand and looked at Jez in the mirror. "You made it worse."

"No, really?" she tugged pointedly on her arm and sneered, "I hadn't noticed."

Morgead rolled his eyes and reached to unscrew the jar. "Just stop poking at it and let me try and put some of this in it."

Jez scowled but let her arm go limp. "I don't think I trust you near my hair, you know." She glared at the floor as Morgead scooped a mound of peanut butter up with his fingers.

"I don't think you really have a choice here Jezebel. Just shut up and hold still."

"Whatever," Jez grumbled, slouching down and crossing her arms tightly. "just hurry it up, we've got to leave in a few minutes. And don't call me Jezebel."

"Hmm."

Morgead worked on smearing peanut butter through Jez's hair as she swapped between glaring daggers at his head and poking absently at the bruise under her eye. Catching a stray boot to the face while wrestling with Morgead wasn't going to help her case today at all.

"Try taking out your hand now."

Jez scowled and slid her fingers out from the nest of tangles she's made on top of her own head. Tugging them out, she stared in disgust.

"They're covered in crud!"

"What did you expect, you idiot?" Morgead scowled. "Just be happy you don't have to walk around the whole day with your hand on your head."

"Whatever." Jez stared at her sticky fingers in distaste a moment more before she reached around behind her and wiped them furiously on Morgead's shirt. Morgead swore loudly and jumped backwards, bringing a clump of red hair with him. Jez shrieked and stumbled after him in a feeble attempt to lessen the pain shooting through her scalp.

"What the hell Jez?"

"My head! My hair!"

"Jesus Jezebel," Morgead growled. He tugged his shirt away from his body and glared at the smear of gunk across the stomach. "What was that for?"

"Don't tell me you weren't expecting it!"

Morgead snarled and turned and stomped for the door. "Forget this! I'm going home!"

"Oh, fine!" Jez yelled. "You asshole, I can do this without you!" Jez yelled louder when she heard Morgead's boots pounding the stairs. "I wouldn't even need to do this in the first place if it weren't for you!"

The front door slammed, and Jez let out a frustrated scream, whipping the discarded jar of peanut butter against the wall. Against her better judgment, she watched through narrowed eyes as Morgead trudged down her laneway and punched the mail box as he turned onto the road.

"Arg! Stupid Morgead!" Jez turned back to the mirror and stared at herself. "Damn it. He was my ride too…"

First the boot. Then the gum. The peanut butter. The hat. And the latest installment in Jez's day: the bus.

With Uncle Bracken away on business, and Jez's bike that she shouldn't be old enough to ride in the shop, she had been counting on Morgead to get her to school. After Morgead stormed out, Jez had come to the horrible realization that she would be forced to get on and ride a school bus.

But there was still the matter of her hair. A problem which she first attempted to solve with an old hat – one of Morgead's toques to be exact. Being unable to extract all of the peanut butter even with water and a brush, and with a hunk of chewing gum still imprisoned in her hair, Jez was forced to stoop so low as to stuffing as much of her hair as possible up under Morgead's black toque. It left a few inches of hair untucked and sticking out the bottom, but it did the job.

On her way out the door, Jez grabbed a hoodie and flipped up the hood. She even grabbed a pair of dark sunglasses for good measure.

The bus nearly sped right by her. It wasn't until it was within spitting distance that the driver realized he was supposed to be stopping for the girl who wasn't normally there. The yellow monstrosity screeched to a stop a few feet past Jez, who was trying to look as inconspicuous as possible.

But of course, as soon as the doors hissed open, every head in every seat was turned and staring at Jez as she prowled down the aisle.

When Jez realized that there were no empty seats and that she'd have to sit with someone, she silently cursed Morgead for leaving her more or less stranded. Jez couldn't even remember the last time she'd taken the bus. Before Morgead started driving she'd left earlier and walked to school. Sometimes Morgead would even come with her if he got up early enough.

Letting lose a semi-audible string of curse words, Jez threw herself into a seat with a boy who had abandoned gawking at her in favour of the dull scenery outside.

When the bus lurched back into motion and half-hearted conversations kicked back into full swing, the boy sitting next to Jez peered at her from the corner of his eye.

"Jez?"

Jez started and looked blankly at the boy sitting next to her. He had unfamiliar boyish features and brown hair and was staring at her with something like profound befuddlement.

Looking away awkwardly, Jez muttered half-heartedly, "Am I supposed to know you?"

"Uh, I'm in like, three of your classes." When Jez continued to stare blankly at him, the boy sighed and prompted, "Connor? Connor Reed? I sit beside you in geography and something like, two seats in front of you in math class"

"Uhh…"

"We were lab partners last year."

"Really?" Jez tilted her head to get a better look at Connor out of the side of her glasses. "I'm not even going to bother to pretend to know who you are. I would say "I'm sorry" but then that would be lying."

Connor snorted and muttered, "Just as nice as everyone says…" he blushed under the heat of Jez's glare and stammered, "So ah, what's with the thug look? Normally it's just the biker gear."

"Well, if you must know," Jez sniffed, smoothing down her hood and tucking a stray stand of hair back underneath her tuque. "I had a bit of an accident with some gum this morning."

"Then why the glasses?"

"There was also a heavy boot involved."

Connor gave Jez a strange look as the bus pulled into the school lot. "A boot?"

Jez grunted and shouldered her backpack.

"Er, wait so, why are you on the bus today? I didn't even know you lived near me."

"You ask too many questions, Cory," Jez snapped.

"It's Connor. Whatever," Connor glanced sidelong at Jez and asked, "You do know what day today is, right?"

Jez stood up while the bus was still moving and marched up the aisle. She squeezed through the doors as soon as they began to open and half jogged to her locker. As she slipped through the doors to the school she thought she heard Connor snort under his breath behind her, "Good luck."

A dull mechanical buzz signaled the coming announcement. It had been a constant onslaught of interruptions that made the teachers scowl and glare for the past hour as students were called to the library.

"All students with their last name starting with P to R, please make your way up to the school library with your forms."

Jez stood up along with a few others from her class and made her way to the door. Jez was sure to keep her head down as she'd been forced to ditch the glasses first period, but she noticed Connor get up from across the room and awkwardly make his way towards the door.

So he hadn't been lying then, he really was in some of Jez's classes.

He caught up to her as she trudged down the hall and chuckled. "Not looking forward to this I gather?"

"You know, I bet you'd look great with a black eye."

Connor chuckled again – nervously this time Jez noticed – and peered under her hood as he opened his mouth with what was to be an inevitably dorky comeback. Instead his mouth popped shut and he blinked, looking at Jez's discoloured eye. "You mean like yours?" he asked. "Is that what you were talking about when you said something about a boot?"

Jez huffed and crossed her arms angrily. "Yeah, so what?"

A man Jez didn't think she recognised motioned for the students to line up and have their slips ready. Jez moved to one of the longer lines and Connor followed.

"So, what? Did a boot just fall out of the sky and hit you in the eye?"

"No, you freak," Jez growled, crumpling her slip and resisting the urge to punch the boy behind her. He was persistent. Though not in the way that boys usually were with Jez – flirting endlessly and trying for her attention. That she could deal with. Those boys would give up and go away as soon as the next pretty girl came along. But Connor was the type of persistent that was fuelled by curiosity, and he would undoubtedly not go away until he was satisfied with what he found.

"So then what happened?"

Jez sighed and counted the people ahead of her. "I got kicked in the face."

"What? By who? When?"

Another student disappeared behind the screen and a flash followed a few seconds later. Only eight more people to go.

"My friend," Jez huffed light strands of hair from her face. "and, this morning."

"Wow, doesn't sound like much of a friend," Connor looked around absently as he mused, "So what did you do? Steal her lip gloss?"

"Not likely," Jez growled.

Connor rolled his eyes and stared straight at Jez. "So then what happened?"

Another person moved behind the backdrop and Jez deflated. "He was chewing gum, I tackled him, popped the giant bubble he was blowing, got kicked in the face and gum stuck in my hair."

"All this this morning?" Connor looked like he was trying not to laugh.

"Yes! Now cram it!"

Jez spun round and clamped her lips tightly shut. With her hands fisted in her sweater pockets she waited as the three people left in front of her each took their turn. Finally, Jez was standing at the front of the line, dreading stepping behind the curtain and having to discard her hood and tuque.

"Next!"

Jez slouched down and moaned in distress as she trudged up to the blond woman who she'd have to give her slip of paper to. The woman took the paper and glanced down at it.

"Jezebel Redfern?"

Jez nodded and slouched onto the stool and stared straight ahead. She woman peered at her irritably from behind her camera and said, "Hon, you're gonna have to take off that hood."

Jez glared at her until she looked uncomfortable, then she shed her hoodie.

"The hat too, dear."

Jez took a minute and worked her jaw. She counted to ten and picked at her lip.

"The hat, sweetie," the woman prompted icily.

Jez growled, but she managed to stay put instead of pouncing on the blond bunny behind the camera stand. Jez peeled the tuque from her head and cringed. The camera woman's eyes popped wide open and she opened and closed her mouth like a fish.

Finally, she seemed to rouse herself and absently told Jez to smile. She snapped a quick picture, and Jez saw she barely glanced at the screen to see it. She motioned Jez away and called out for the next person in line to come up.

Connor walked up just as Jez was pulling the tuque over her head and stuffing her hair up into it. He coughed in a way that didn't quite cover up his laugh and plodded to the stool to sit down.

Jez cursed at him underneath her breath and pulled her hoodie back on. Less than confident that her hair and face were well hidden, Jez made her way as casually back to class as she could.

"I look like a monster."

Jez, Morgead, and Jez's Uncle Bracken all stood at the kitchen table staring down at Jez's school picture. A Jez with an ugly green bruise underneath one eye and hair that looked as if a rabid mongoose had performed a mating ceremony in it glared darkly back at them.

"This is going to be in the year book, on my student id, everyone's going to see it, and I look like a mutant! A grade A freak! I'll never be able to show my face anywhere again," Jez wailed in anguish and collapsed onto one of the chairs. She hid her face in her arms and moaned incoherently.

It was otherwise quiet until Morgead muttered, "No arguments here."

thanks for reading :) hope you liked it and I hope it didn't seem sloppy or sound funny cause it's like 4 am and I haven't written anything in MOTHS as I'm sure some of you may have noticed ;) anyway please review! tell me what you think or give me request or ideas :)